The Essential Tom Petty, in 9 Songs

There’s a joke in Marc Maron’s new comedy special where he suggests Tom Petty could be the artist who bridges the gap between the left and the right. He’s not wrong. The Heartbreakers leader could unite hardcore rock’n’rollers and casual pop listeners with the undeniability of his guitar licks, Boomer parents and their millennial kids with his bizarre music videos, Southerners and Northerners with just the stubborn song “I Won’t Back Down.” He meant a little something different to everyone, and that’s part of what made him one of classic rock radio’s most enduring voices.

The other reason he remained a staple of radio (and MTV, for a time) was because he wrote a lot of Perfect Songs. As an entry point into Petty’s catalog or just a mournful relisten, Pitchfork offers what we think are his most essential songs. It’s a small sampling of work that’s as dynamic and sprawling as the country it unknowingly helped to unite, so consider it just a starting point for your Tom Petty listening today.

“Breakdown” (1977)

Was Petty a punk? The comparison may sound unlikely now, but with the strong first single from Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers’ self-titled debut, the question was worth wondering. “Breakdown” had at least enough Jagger-style sneer and cocksure strut to mark Petty as a pissed-off rock star in the making. —Marc Hogan

“American Girl” (1977)

Upon release, the Heartbreakers’ second single wasn’t actually a hit in America. That never stopped it from becoming a paradigm of quintessentially American rock’n’roll, so much so that its iconic guitar jitter was openly copped by the Strokes for “Last Nite.” But what’s most fascinating about “American Girl,” and perhaps most American in a weird way, is how some listeners hear in it a story about heartbreak and suicide, while others see a girl anxious for her life to really start. Petty had a way with deceptively insightful lyrics in pop songs; cloaked in those riffs, handclaps, and “oohs,” “American Girl” marked the start of that tradition. —Jillian Mapes

“Refugee” (1979)

Producer Jimmy Iovine called Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers’ classic third album, Damn the Torpedoes, “the best album [he] ever made, sonically,” and it’s not hard to hear what he means: It stands as the clearest, cleanest document of the Heartbreakers’ heartland power. In the opening song “Refugee,” Stan Lynch’s snare drums pound like gloves against a punching bag, while Benmont Tench turns his organs into a cloud of smoke hanging over the whole affair. “Refugee” remains one of Petty’s most enduring anthems, still bursting from the speakers with an energy all its own. —Sam Sodomsky

“The Waiting” (1981)

Tom Petty’s fourth album, Hard Promises, arrived with a righteous battle against his label, MCA, which wanted to hike up album prices. Petty would wage war against such industry shenanigans throughout his career (most notably on his 2002 album The Last DJ), and Hard Promises marked the point where he had learned to take these matters into his own hands. But the album also proved that Petty had mastered the pop song. Soaring lead single “The Waiting” is Byrds-ian folk rock executed with passion and wisdom, where Petty meets universal truths with music that seems just as instinctive. —SS

“You Got Lucky” (1982)

Petty was a shrewd navigator of genre, veering subtly from heartland rock to breezy reggae, from power-pop to 12-bar blues. He was also pretty great at new-wave singalongs, as evidenced by the spiky Long After Dark single “You Got Lucky.” In a discography full of cathartic, shoutable choruses, this track has one of Petty’s most remarkable ones. “Good love is hard to find,” he wails, sounding thoroughly jaded after learning it the hard way. “You got lucky, babe,” he concludes sadly, like he’s trying to convince himself of his words, “when I found you.” —SS

“Don’t Come Around Here No More” (1985)

Petty and the Heartbreakers’ sixth album, 1986’s Southern Accents, was ostensibly a concept record about the American South. Sure enough, the title of “Don’t Come Around Here No More” was a down-home phrase. But the music, written and producers with Dave Stewart of the Eurythmics, centered that mesmerizing hook within sitar, strings, backing vocals, and a shimmer of electronics. Throw in an unforgettable Alice in Wonderland-inspired video, and it’s no wonder this was one of Petty’s biggest hits, and covered by acts from Vampire Weekend to Bleachers. —MH

“I Won’t Back Down” (1989)

Petty could be rousingly political, too. In 1985, Petty & the Heartbreakers played at Live Aid, which led to time on the road with Bob Dylan, and eventually time in the studio, as quintessential supergroup Traveling Wilburys, with Dylan, Roy Orbison, George Harrison, and Electric Light Orchestra’s Jeff Lynne. “I Won’t Back Down” is from Petty’s (technically) first solo album, 1989’s Full Moon Fever, and it showcases Lynne’s crisp work as producer in its taut down-strums and punchy drums. But its most memorable for its lyrics, a message of stoic defiance against forces which go unnamed but are deeply felt. —MH

“Mary Jane’s Last Dance” (1993)

Rarely does the requisite “newly recorded bonus track” come anywhere close to the preceding hits on a best-of compilation. Leave it to Tom Petty to step up to the plate. “Last Dance for Mary Jane,” from his 12x platinum Greatest Hits set, emerged from the same Rick Rubin sessions that yielded his solo 1994 album Wildflowers, but its dark cheekiness is a far cry from Wildflowers’ heartworn ballads. A full band cut with enough funk to get aped by the Red Hot Chili Peppers and enough twang to get jacked by Kenny Chesney, “Last Dance” was a composition like none in Petty’s songbook. With an instantly infectious groove, it could—and did—go toe-to-toe with his biggest hits. —SS

“You Don’t Know How It Feels” (1994)

Tom Petty’s music had always been romantic and honest (sometimes brutally so), but writing about his recent divorce in the starkest songs of his career, he felt like a raw nerve with 1994’s Wildflowers. “You Don’t Know How It Feels” is the encapsulation of the album’s narrator: the heartbroken hero and the free-falling stoner. During the verses, Petty sings in a whisper over crisp snare hits, as he puts it, “in between a memory and a dream.” But then that singalong chorus comes rolling along like an 18-wheeler down an open road. Just like that, you’re riding shotgun with him, windows rolled down, and the radio’s drowning out the sorrow. Wildflowers marked a ’90s high point for Petty, and “You Don’t Know How It Feels” a personal anthem of sorts. —SS